


Can't Stop the Dicks Bro

by ScriptedAssimilation



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dave abuses time travel to experiment with himself, Established Friendship, Eventual Davekat, Homophobia, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Meteorstuck, Rating will probably go up, Retcon Timeline, Self-cest, Selfcest, Sloppy Makeouts, Time Travel, but the goal is to get with Karkat, more tags to come, this takes place about a year into the journey so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-13
Updated: 2018-05-08
Packaged: 2018-09-23 23:03:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 10
Words: 18,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9686054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScriptedAssimilation/pseuds/ScriptedAssimilation
Summary: Your name is Dave Strider, and you can't get the thought of your best bro out of your head, or the feel of your own lips out of your mind.You think you might actually be a little bit gay.But you really, really don't want to think about it.Or, in which Dave abuses his time travel powers on the meteor to see if he is actually interested in kissing guys.  Guys being Karkat.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> eyy, there's not enough selfcest fics out there, so I thought I would fix that. I haven't really written Dave before, and he's tricky, but I had a lot of fun with it.

You’re lying on your mattress thinking about Karkat. This is becoming a theme with you. By now, a little more than a year into your journey, he’s your best bro. So it’s not that weird. You think about the Mayor a lot too, and how to expand Can Town. It definitely needs a strip joint, no matter what Karkat and the Mayor say. Full of male strippers, just for the irony. Oh yeah, a bunch of horny dudes going in to get hot and bothered over a bunch of sexy broads, but no, dick right to the face. Yeah, that would be great.

Uh. Great for the irony. Real funny. Great material. Not great as in, y’know--not going there.

You take your shades off and roll onto your face. Maybe you can smother yourself. Except that wouldn’t even work. Even if it did work, you’d still be in the bubbles and stuck thinking about Karkat’s stupid face.

You just like it when he smiles. When you make him laugh. It’s nice, and you wish you could do it all the time.

Ugh, that’s so gay.

You spend thirty seconds thinking about Terezi’s boobs before your thoughts shift back to Karkat. He’s been all up in your business lately-pushing and shoving playfully, sitting a little too close. It gets your heart racing in a way you don’t want to think about.

It sounds really gay, but you are definitely not gay.

Maybe you could—

“Sup.”

You roll over, and stare yourself in the face. The other Dave is standing by the door of your room, arms crossed but still fidgeting. 

You slide on your shades, which feels a little funny, because it’s you -- what are you trying to hide? He doesn’t say anything though. 

“Thought we weren’t doin the time travel thing,” you say.

“You were literally just thinkin of doing this.”

“Correction, I was right in the middle of thinkin about it.”

“Well shit, man, I’m helpin you then.” Future you flops onto the mattress with you.

“So,” you say.

“So,” he says.

“This is weird.”

“So weird.”

“And not just the double me— “

“The talkin to yourself— “

“And gettin a response— “

“Shit is weirder than a juggalo cleanin himself up— 

“Gettin a steady job as a business man— “

“Workin his way up that corporate ladder until— “

“He’s like, what’s up bitches, ex juggalo c.e.o. now— “

“First rule I decree that everyone must wear trashy fuckin face paint— “

“Second rule is that we all worship the fuckin mirthful messiahs— “

“And stalk around air vent’s creepin everyone the fuck out— “

“Like honk MOTHERFUCKIN honk BITCHES.”

You both shiver.

“So,” you say. “How’s this gonna go?”

“Hang out for a bit. Listen to some dope ass music, try some shit out.”

“What kind of shit? I don’t know if I’m down for this.”

“Stable time loop bro, I know you’re down for it because I was down for it.” Future you pulls out his phone, fiddles with it for a moment before some cheesy pop song comes on.

“Really?” you say.

“This is going to be weird shit; do you really want to ruin good music for yourself?”

You sigh. His hand bumps into your hand, and you pull away.

“C’mon, dude, stable time loop.”

“I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

“Bro, shut the fuck up and hold my hand. This is for science.”

“Gay science.”

“Hella gay science. Just do it.”

You take his hand and lace your fingers together. 

Neither of you look at each other. Neither of you say anything. You just listen to the music and hold your own hand.

You…wouldn’t mind doing this with Karkat. It’s weird when it’s with yourself. So weird. So fucked up. Rose would have a field day if she knew you were experimenting with yourself. You make a strangled noise.

“You just realized,” future you says.

“That we’re— “

“Experimentin— “

“With being fuckin— “

“Gay.”

“Fuck,” you both say, perfectly in sync. It’s kind of funny how well you match up with yourself.

“What are you thinkin about?” You ask future you.

“How much better this would be with Karkat.”

“Same.”

“I know, bro.”

“That’s gay.”

“I know.”

Both of you groan, let go of your hands, and roll onto your sides, facing away from each other.

Shitty pop music plays. You both roll back over, so you're on your opposite side, facing each other, nearly forehead to forehead. 

“Are we goin to talk about the Karkat problem?” You say.

“Fuck no.”

“Cool.”

“The coolest. This shit is on ice.”

“This shit is so cold Antarctica is jealous.”

“Shit be so cold, it's gettin frostbite, all stickin to the ground, spearin unknowing walkers by in the foot with its icy shit spikes.”

“The shit is approachin absolute zero, scientists want to study it, but shit’s too cold, they can’t get close enough to it. That shit is terminally cold.”

“The shit is causin the heat death of the universe, it's suckin all the fuckin warmth out of the galaxy, and it’s still so fuckin cold.”

“People are withering up, skin tightenin ‘till its taunt on their faces and crackin off like porcelain.”  
“Dicks are shrivelin up and curlin back into hot dudes' bodies.”

“Oh no, man, not the dicks.”

“I know, it’s a tragedy.”

“What are we goin to do in a universe without any dicks?”

“Die, probably.”

“Shit, you’re right.”

Your foreheads are touching now, shades clicking up against each other.

“Uh,” you say.

“Shut up, close your eyes, and pretend I’m Karkat.”

And then future you is kissing you.

His lips are chapped, but warm. And he’s gentle, so gentle. You close your eyes.

This is weird, so weird. This is your first real kiss and it’s with yourself. 

He pulls the tiniest bit away. His lips still brush against yours as he talks.

“You’re, uh, supposed to kiss back.”

“Oh,” you say. “Sorry it's just— “

“So weird, I know. You think it’s not even weirder the second time?”

“Oh god I’m goin to have to— “

“Yep. Just shut up and think about Karkat. It helps I promise.”

“I don’t want to kiss him; I’m not fuckin gay.”

“Dude, c’mon, I’m you. We both know if I say you’re goin to do it, you’re goin to do it.”

“I don’t know how I’m goin to keep this shit stable.”

“You know what to do, just do it.”

You hesitate. “Ok,” you say.

And then he’s kissing you again. And you kiss him back. You’re both clumsy and awkward, bumping noses.

Think about Karkat.

 

Karkat’s lips would probably be rougher. He’d be more aggressive. You pull away.

“Dude, if I’m goin to pretend you're Karkat, you got to pretend you’re Karkat.”

“Right. Sit up.” 

“Uh.”

“Dude, I got this, ok?”

You sit up, and he pushes you gently to the wall, then plops himself in your lap.

“Uh.”

“Karkat.”

“Right.”

And then he grabs your hair and pulls you into another kiss. This one is a lot more forceful, and it’s so, so easy to close your eyes and imagine it’s Karkat’s hands in your hair, tugging you closer.

You slide your hands around his neck, and he, Karkat, settles more fully into your lap.

You feel his tongue slide against your lips. You jump, and your shades click. Future Dave pulls away.

“It’s the— “

“I know,” he says, tearing his shades off and tossing them on the mattress. And then he’s back to kissing you; Karkat you think, is back to kissing you. His hands are on your shoulders, his tongue is on your lips, and you open them for him.

You slide your arms around Karkat’s waist and pull him closer. He slips his tongue tentatively out, and you meet him.

It’s…honestly not as great as you hoped. It’s still good, but it’s not like, as magical as Karkat’s books and romcoms make it seemed to be. It’s mostly just wet. But you still like it.

His teeth clack against yours. It feels gross, and bad, but you bear through it, and he kisses you softly like an apology. Karkat brings one hand to your face and gently tilts it up, kissing the corner of your mouth, down your jawline, behind your ear, down your neck.

You let out a shaky sigh. It feels nice. It feels good.

And then there’s a loud, knuckle-shattering knock on your door.

“Dave, open the fuck up, you were supposed to meet me in Can Town twenty fucking minutes ago! We’re installing a new observatory, and you know you’re the only one with the bullshit floaty powers needed to draw constellations that better not be dicks on the ceiling. Dave, I’m coming in!”

The weight in your lap disappears a second before the door opens.

Karkat looks you up and down. “Are you alright? You look a little red. You sick or something? I don’t want to catch a weird alien bug and die like the aliens in your stupid movie.”  
You get to your feet, tug on your shoes.

“Yeah, I’m fine, I was just -- I’m fine. Let’s go draw some dicks.”

“You’re not allowed to draw any dicks, Dave. As your literal god, I forbid you to draw any dicks.”

“Can’t stop the dicks bro. Can’t stop the dicks. Let’s go.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't gone to bed yet that means its still sunday, right? Anyways, new chapter, feat. Karkat.

It’s not a long walk from your room to Can Town. Karkat is going on about something, probably development of the observatory, but behind your stoic visage, you’re kind of reeling. Like, a lot.  
You just had your first kiss, your first makeout, and they were with yourself. And you, you gotta be honest with yourself, you kind of enjoyed it.  
You made out with a boy who is also you, while thinking of another boy, and enjoyed it.

You are so fucked.

You’re just. Not going to think about it. Not going to think about how you’re going to have to go back in time, and, and, and straddle yourself, and and—

You just tripped over Can Town’s national library.

“Dave, what the fuck is wrong with you today?” Karkat says.

“I uh, nothin. I’m fine.” It’s a lie, it’s a huge fucking lie.

“Hoofbeast shit. You just destroyed a fundamental resource. Citizens are screaming as whole generations of children are wiped out by a brutal structural collapse. Wrigglers are going to become illiterate, Dave. Illiterate! Is that what you want? A whole generation of dumb as fuck kids who don’t know how to read books? They’ll miss all the classics! There will be riots. Huge fucking riots. Started by me if you don’t start rebuilding efforts immediately.”

“Well shit, man. Can’t let the little kids go illiterate. How will they read your quote unquote classic dime store smut novels?”

You kneel down and start the rebuilding efforts.

“They’re not smut novels, they’re romance novels. We’ve gone over this.”

“Karkat, all the covers have half naked dudes on the front swoonin over other half naked dudes.”

He crosses his arms and does the little huff that he does. “No Dave, they don’t. You only seem interested in the ones with guys on the covers. I read the full variety of the spectrum! You just don’t make fun of me for the ones with all girls, or a mix.”

“Well, yeah, cuz it’s normal for guys to be into that kind of shit. Like, not to be readin romance, duh, but if you’re gonna read porn, it’s gonna be either straight or lesbian. Like, aw yeah bro-- need those tits or it’s gay.”

He plops down on his ass next you, absentmindedly handing you spilled cans.

“You’re such an alien, Strider.”

“Says the one with grey skin and horns.”

“Says the one with brown skin and fake yellow hair.”

“Hey, my hair is not fake.”

“Oh, it just naturally grows in black at the roots?”

“Just because I bleach it doesn’t mean it’s fake.”

“I bet it even feels fake. Probably feels like dried vegetation shoots.”

He lunges forward and pats your hair. You freeze as he runs his fingers through it.

“Huh,” he says, taking his hand away and feeling his own hair. “It’s softer than mine. Weird.”

“Uh, yeah. I take really good care of it.”

“Here, fuckface, look.” He grabs your hand and your pulse takes off. He rests it on top of his head, and you kind of rub your hand back and forth. His hair is kind of prickly. Coarse. Like hair is after going to the beach and soaking it in salt water. Or at least, what you’d imagine it must be like.

“It’s uh. Nice though.”

He tilts his head, frowning. “That’s what I used to think, but now I just think it's kind of scraggly. Karkat Vantas, gross hair contest winner of the objective vicinity. I get a badge and a pretty fucking ribbon that says number one on it. Nobody is jealous. Except Gamzee, but let’s not tell him. And Dave, you can stop now, y’know. I mean, you don’t have to, but— “

You pull your hand away like you’ve been burned. You can actually feel your face heating up.

“Sorry, that was really gay.”

He groans. “Again with that? That’s the homosexual one, right?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“I don’t see what your problem is with it! Yes, Dave, I’m human gay. I like boys. So does Gamzee. So does Vriska and Terezi. We’re all human gay, Dave.”

“No, bro, no, that’s not how it works. Vriska and Terezi aren’t gay because they’re into dudes, they’re just straight, they’re normal.”

“What does normal even mean! We’re normal, Dave. You are literally the only one on this fucking rock that has a problem with being with someone of the same gender. Most of us like, oh, guess what? Like both girls and boys! And yet somehow, you’re the one that has the biggest fixation on human dicks. Don’t you think that’s --” he actually does scare quotes here-- “gay.”

You backpedal real hard. “What no bro. That’s not how it works. Dicks are just great: dudes are supposed to always talk about how big and great their dicks are. It’s not gay, it’s like, dude rule number one. Dicks are great.”

“That sounds really fucking gay.”

“No! It’s not! Gay is like, kissin another boy.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing!” He’s gesturing wildly, big, vague sweeps of his hands. You, on the other hand, are curling in on yourself as he gets louder and louder.

“Dude, it kind of is a bad thing. You’re not supposed to want to kiss guys.”

“Why not?” 

You cringe. He’s so loud, holy fuck.

“I don’t know man, you’re just. Not supposed to. It’s bad to be gay. Guys are supposed to be big and tough and into banging chicks and stuff, y’know?”

“So let me get this straight. You look down on me because I want to kiss guys?”

“What? No! You’re cool, you’re my bro. And you’re an alien, so it hardly matters that you're gay.”

“Oh, so if I were a human male, it wouldn’t be ok?”

“Agh, Karkat, what do you want me to say here?”

He narrows his eyes. He’s looking at you funny, and you can’t help but feel very small despite the fact he’s a good four inches shorter than you.

Then he lets out a big sigh, and carefully lies down on his back between the buildings.

“I want you to say, ‘Oh, Karkat, you’re right! I was the biggest, ugliest brute in paradox space--and I’m including Jack here--to ever think otherwise. Thank you for enlightening me to the full span of romantic interest! Please, teach me about quadrants again! I swear I won’t derail your lesson with a cheesy rap about how much I don’t care. Going on and on, until we both dissolve into giggles and vandalize Rose’s tome into a frankly shocking rendition of a grid. Accentuated by human dicks, might I add’. Fuck, Dave, I don’t get why this is such a big fucking deal to you. I was flirting with John so hard and he didn’t get this excruciatingly worked up about it. He just rejected me. That’s it!”

You bite your lip and think about the events that took place under an hour ago. Events that will have to repeat the same way very fucking soon.

“I just…” You don’t know what you just. It seems pretty silly to keep arguing about how you’re not gay after you just kind of proved that you are, at least a little. And for Karkat of all people. “I have to go.”

He jerks up at that, but you’re already on your feet. “No, fuck, Dave, wait.”

You start float up a couple inches off the floor, suddenly too tired to walk, and start making your way back to your room.

A warm hand grabs yours, and tugs. The force pulls you back into him, crashing back into him, and you both go down, taking out several buildings as you bounce apart.

“Fucking ow,” Karkat hisses, while you just groan.

You both sit up.

“The Mayor is going to be so pissed,” you say.

“No he’s not, he’s the Mayor; the Mayor is great.”

“Shit, you’re right.”

There’s an awkward silence between the two of you.

“Did you, uh, want something?” You ask.

He bites his lip.

“No.” He finally decides on. “No, I just. No.”

“Oh. Ok. I’ll see you later then.”

“See you, Dave.”

You feel a little empty as you float back to your room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A++ communication skills you got there boys


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a rougher one. Dave dealing with the repercussions of the last chapter. But it gets lighter, I promise. Feelings are talked about, at least a little.

You float into your room and collapse on your mattress. You feel so gross. So, so gross. You want to shower for a million years and drown yourself. You just, you just…

God fucking damn it, you have to close the loop.

You compose yourself. Get your shit on lock down. It takes ten minutes. You stand, walk to the door, like future you did, and pull out your timetables. You don’t know how far in the future he was, so you just go to what feels right.

“Sup.” You say.

Past you rolls over. “Thought we weren’t doin the time travel thing,”

You do what feels right. You do what you’re supposed to do, say what you’re supposed to say. Time travel isn’t easy, stable time loops aren’t easy, and this is such a stupid thing to be risking a doomed timeline for, but you have no choice but to continue with it now.

You’re lying down on the mattress next to past you.

You know what you have to do. You bump his hand. He pulls away. You want to too. But you don’t. You make your quips, and lace your fingers together.

You just lie there, listen to the music, feeling a little dead inside.

Think about Karkat.

It feels wrong. Liking boys feels wrong.

Past Dave makes a strangled noise.

“You just realized,” you say.

“That we’re— “

“Experimentin— “

“With being fuckin— “

“Gay.”

“Fuck,” you both say. You know he’s not feeling the way you are. He’s thinking about Karkat. You’re thinking about Karkat too. But it’s not the same. He’s feeling hopeful. You’re feeling…empty. You’re feeling gross after that conversation with him.

You’re feeling kind of dirty because, after doing this the first time, you know you want to hold Karkat’s hand. That you want to kiss him.

And boys aren’t supposed to want to kiss boys. What would Bro think of you?

You let go of past you’s hand and roll away from him, at the same time as he rolls away from you.

You take a deep breath, try to clear your head.

You have to do this. You have to do this, no matter how fucked up it is.

You might as well try to enjoy it.

You and past you ramble on and on. It makes you feel better. The sound of your own voice is always soothing.

You roll back over, forehead nearly touching past you.

Yeah, you could really use some physical contact right now. You’ve never really had it before, but you get the feeling it will help.

“Shut up, close your eyes, and pretend I’m Karkat.” You say, as much for your benefit as his.

And then you kiss him. He’s warm, and it's less weird the second time. He doesn’t kiss back.  
You mumble against his lips, and then you’re kissing again.

And really, kissing is so nice.

He pulls away. Shit, it’s time to pretend you’re Karkat.

Full body contact. Going to be awkward, but, also, it’s going to be nice.

You straddle yourself, and pretend you're straddling Karkat. You grab past you (Karkat) by the hair, and kiss him will all the frustration you feel about this.

As fucked up as it is, physical contact is so nice. You grew up without any, you’ve lived your life without any, and fuck, you want to get closer.

So you do, pushing your chest into past you’s, Karkat’s, chest.

Your shades click, you rip them off and go back to kissing. You don’t want to think right now; you just want to feel.

You want to touch, so you do, putting your hands on his shoulders, your tongue on his lips.

You’re making out in earnest now, his hands slip around your waist and it feels so right.

You tilt past you’s head up, up, kiss down his neck. He takes a shuddery breath.  
And then there’s the knock on the door, and you’re gone.

Back to the present.

You feel cold now. You can feel the ghost sensation of warmth on your front, and the heat of lips on lips.

You curl up on your mattress, wrap yourself in blankets, and go to sleep.

You jolt awake an indeterminate time later. Someone is in the room with you. In a second, your sword is in your hands.

“Sup.” Future you says.

“Again?” you groan, sticking your sword back in your sylladex. 

“You know the drill, dude. You are fuckin intimate with the drill. The drill is all up your business, making tender, tender love to your asshole. Stickin its drill bits up your butt— “

“Ugh, fine. Now I know how other people feel when talkin to us. Let’s just get on with it already.”

You flop down on the bed, and future you flops next to you.

He pushes lightly at your shoulder, so you roll, and he spoons up behind you. He throws an arm over your waist, pulls you back until your ass is pressed up against his pelvis.

“Uh…” you say, because you can feel a dick against your ass right now.

“Shut up,” future you says. “The less we talk, the easier this will be to keep stable.”

“Are we physically capable of shutting up?”

“I know one way.”

“Oh fuck.”

But you don’t kiss. You just lie there, cuddled up. Slowly, your prior feelings of frustration melt away. It’s nice to be held like this. You feel…safe. Safe and warm. 

Maybe this is a thing you can actually do. You wiggle a little, turning in future you’s arms, so you can flip over and press your face against his chest. He shifts, sitting up for a second, and pulls your blanket over both of you. You resume cuddling, face pressed into his neck, hands in each other’s hair.

Your eyes begin to droop. Your breathing slows. You fall back asleep.

When you wake, the next whatever passes as morning in the void, he’s still here. Still has an arm lazily thrown around you, and, to your surprise, neither of you has moved.

You don’t want to move either.

“Mornin,” future you says.

“Mornin,” you say back.

He runs a hand through your hair, tilts your face up, and kisses you.

You close your eyes, and kiss him softly. You think this is the best ‘morning’ you’ve ever had.

He pulls back after a couple minutes of chaste kissing.

“This is going to become a thing, isn’t it?” you ask.

“It’s already a thing, bro.” And then he’s sitting up, timetables out, and he’s gone.

The next time you see Karkat is later that day, in Can Town. While the Mayor directs you on where to draw the planets on the ceiling, Karkat suggests a movie night. It’s nothing new. You have movie nights all the time.

Twenty minutes later, you have a bowl of popcorn between you as you settle into the couch in the one of the more abandoned rooms. Its freezing in here. Karkat’s crabtop is out, and some shitty romcom featuring Dane Cook is on. Halfway through, Karkat decaptchalogues a blanket and wraps himself up in it. You’re jealous, you can’t stand it, so you settle on shoving as much popcorn into your mouth as possible. Karkat is enraptured. You watch him instead of the movie, as his eyebrows furrow, eyes widen. When you’re out of popcorn, you move the bowl to the floor. When the movie’s over, Karkat puts on another one, sitting closer to you than before. You’re almost touching.

You give a loud, dramatic sigh.

“What’s your fucking problem Dave? You don’t even know the movie yet. Unless you have somehow suddenly switched your class from noble knight to annoying seer, I’m calling hoofbeast shit on you so hard. The hoofbeast shit will come so rapidly out of its asshole that it creates a cannon of shit that hits you straight in the mouth. Because that’s what’s coming out of your mouth now. Hoofbeast shit,” he says.

“It’s another romcom isn’t it?”

“Dave, you fucking know as well as I do that romcoms are the only movies that exist on this meteor, so shut your squawk gaper and enjoy it.”

“Ugh, fine, whatever. At least let me in on that blanket action. Pajamas are great and all, but I’m goin to freeze my balls off over here”

He lifts and arm and unwraps himself.

Your heart jumps as you settle in closer to him, pressed up against him, his arm around you as he wraps the blanket back up.

You sit like that for the next half hour as you slowly warm up. He leans into you, glancing at you out of the corner of his eye.

“This is— “you start, and he pulls away immediately.

“Really gay, I know. Could you just shut up for one fucking day about your hang ups about gender and admit that sharing body heat on this godforsaken bone chilling rock is a worthy strategy of avoiding fucking frostbite?”

You take a chance, leaning back into him, and he stiffens. “I was, uh, g-gonna say it was nice.”

“Oh,” he says, a little too loud. “Yeah, it is.”

He scooches closer and rests his head on your shoulder, glancing up at you out of the corner of his eye.

You like it. You don’t say anything, and he smiles a little, shifting his eyes back to the movie.

You sit like that for a while. For the rest of the movie. Karkat goes to put on another one. You groan and flop over on the couch.

“Dude, I’m tired. Aren’t you ready to call it a night yet? Bro, my eyelids are so droopy I’m goin to need an army of toothpicks to hold them up. Actually, that shit would probably be hella sharp, so maybe, like, duct tape. Duct tape solves everything. You can even make a fuckin boat out of it. Like toot toot motherfucker, the S.S. fuckin tape boat on its way to set sail. Goin to sail the seven seas like a pro here, break all the awesome levels with its shiny silver majesty.”

He rolls his eyes at you. “Move the fuck over you gargantuanly weak flesh bag. Just one more. This one’s a good one I promise. It’s a fucking classic. It’s called In Which a— “

“Yeah yeah, just put it on.”

Karkat huffs, and you sit up just enough to let him sit, before going limp and resting your head in his lap.

He looks down at you in befuddlement. 

“You’re awfully touchy-feely today, Strider. You sure you don’t have some weird alien parasite slowly taking over your brain with an intent to infect the last of the troll race with mind control worms? Next thing I know, you’re going to suddenly be even more up in by business, dissolving into sloppy interspecies makeouts. Which are expressly forbidden, might I add, despite the fact that Rose and Kanaya seem to take that fact, observe it, then throw it back in my face as they flip me off and stick their language muscles down each other's protein shoots.”

“Sounds good to me.” It just slips out. “I mean, fuck. I must actually have some— “

Karkat is looking down at you. “You mean you...uh, you want to?”

Your face goes red immediately.

“I uh, I don’t know if I-I…Can we j-just, keep doin this?”

Karkat looks like he’s trying very hard to not be disappointed, and your stomach sinks. You want to kiss him. You’ve already established that you like kissing, and that you’re open to the idea of kissing boys. But kissing yourself, as fucked up as it is, still feels kind of like masturbation. Kissing Karkat would make it official. You still have plausible deniability.

Except the snuggling. But. Bros can snuggle right?

Ha ha, you know the bro code doesn’t include snuggling.

“Sure, why the fuck not,” Karkat says. He runs his hand through your hair as the movie plays on. It feels nice. You close your eyes, just for a second.

“Hey Dave?” Karkat says. Your eyes snap open. Karkat never talks during movies. Especially troll movies. You glance at the screen, to find two dudes making out. You look away quick, back at Karkat.

He’s not looking at you, and his face is actually the tiniest bit red. Which is impressive, because in all your xenocultural discussions, you’ve learned that it takes a lot for a troll’s blush to actually show up on their face.

“What’s up, bro.”

“I thought you wouldn’t like this, but, after your most recent unintentional verbal vomit, I figure I might as well follow suit and upchuck some overemotional and bullshit confessions of my own.” He takes a deep breath and your heart pounds because you know where this is going. “But. I like you. A lot. And I don’t want to fuck it up like I did with Terezi, even though I fucking know a rejection is coming up. So, yeah, I like you, I’m not sure how, but mostly red, and I know you’re going to flip your shit off the fucking handle, but I figure I might as well get it out of the way before it eats up my bloodpusher and I explode into ugly pink tears at the thought of seeing your stupid face.”

Your head spins, your face turns red.

“Um.” You say. “Thanks for, y’know, telling me.”

“Yeah, sure, even though you’re probably grossed out now. And not just because of your gender insecurities, but because I am literally the most unattractive life form on this rock. And that's including those weird mutant hoofbeast chess guy monsters.”

You turn on your side, hiding your face in Karkat stomach.

“Dave?” he says.

You mumble into the fabric of his sweater. “No,” you say. “You’re not.”

“As much as enjoy this onslaught of physical contact, for reasons that are now obvious, I would kind of like, oh, I don’t know, and actual coherent response. Is that too much to ask for? Are you going along with the universe to conspire against me, to doom all potential relationships to wither and die in the world of lack of communication and quadrant mixing? Because at least on the first front, I’m really fucking trying here. So just get to the ‘I’m not a homosexual’ part already.”

You sit up, stay facing away from him.

“In light of recent, um…discoveries. I am much less grossed out than I thought I’d be. I can’t like, be your b-boyfriend or anything but…”

“But?” Karkat asks, voice still quiet for him.

You hunch your shoulders, curling in on yourself. “I like this.”

“This?”

“The, y’know. Physical contact.”

Karkat snorts. “I would have thought you were ‘too cool’ for that. Especially something so pale. Which, news flash, update in the Derse fucking herald, you are the least cool piece of literal garbage on this rock.”

You pull your hood up over your head and wrap your cape around you.

“I’ve just.” You can’t, you can’t do this. This is too much talking about feelings; you’re not supposed to talk about feelings so much. You’re not supposed to be so open, so honest.

But it's just so easy to with Karkat. Easy in a way that it never is with anyone else.

“You just?”

“I’ve never had it before.”

“What, coolness factor? It's like you’ve finally seen the light. I’m a miracle worker. Gamzee can start worshiping me instead of those lame ass clown gods that freak us all the fuck out.” 

“No,” you say, voice nearly a whisper. “I’m fucking cool as shit, I’ve just. Never touched someone for this long before.”

“What about your guardian?”

You laugh; “What, Bro? No way, man, no fuckin way.”

You feel the couch shift, and suddenly Karkat’s arms are around you.

“That’s shit, Dave. From what I’ve seen in your fucking human movies, you squishy tan flesh bags need physical affection to survive. There’s only one course for this matter, that I, as your god and best friend, feel necessary to bestow on your touch starved ass. And that is maximum cuddling, all the time.” He pauses. “Unless the me being romantically interested in you freaks you the fuck out. I don’t want to force you into doing something you don’t want to do.

Your heart cracks a little, and you lean back into him. You throat hurts. Your eyes water. But you bite down on your tongue hard, and take control of yourself as best as you can.

“It’s cool, bro.”

Ugh, it hurts, it hurts. Your heart actually hurts; your throat actually hurts.

Karkat scoots back, and you almost whimper at the cold that suddenly hits you.

“Come here already then, shit head.”

You turn, still hunched. He’s sitting with his back against the armrest, one leg folded on the couch, the other on the floor.

You know what he wants.

And it's gay. So gay.

You scoot back until your back hits his chest, and he wraps his arms around you, resting his head on your shoulder.

“You good, Dave?”

“Yeah,” you say, voice wavering. “Yeah.”

You fall asleep like that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to think that Karkat learned from the Terezi thing that no, he can't keep it in one quadrant, and no, not talking about it is a shit thing to do. He's trying man. Karkat is trying so hard.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going up a little early this week because I'm going to be busy tomorrow night!

Something moves. 

You’re awake in an instant, falling, caught in blankets in your mad rush to get to your feet and get your sword out. You end up on the floor, legs trapped but sword ready, panicking.

“Holy shit,” Karkat says, hands raised.

Your breathing is coming harsh and ragged, but you put your sword away with shaking hands.

“All I did was move my leg. Are you—are you ok? Dave are you ok?!”

You let yourself slump onto the ground and push your shades more firmly up onto your nose. Your arms fall, heavy, to the ground, still shaking. You didn’t freak out this bad when it was you that woke you up. Maybe because you were in your room? Maybe because it was you, right where you could see you, immediately? You take a deep breath.

“Y-yeah. I’m cool.” You’re vibrating a little bit. But you’re cool. You’re safe. Bro isn’t waking you up to strife. Bro is dead. Just breathe Dave, you’re cool, you’re good, you’re safe. Bro is dead, Bro is dead.

“Uh, hey Dave?”

“Y-yeah?” 

“Are you aware you’re talking out loud?”

“Fuck.” God damn you and your god damn rambling. You've got to get that shit on lock down.

“Is this something you want to talk about?” he says.

You pull the blanket up over your face. “Nope.” You expect him to push. 

He…doesn’t.

“I…well…ok. Do you want some—fuck I’m so bad at this—coffee or something? Or apple juice, you have that sick fetish for apple juice—Rose said she was getting close so maybe—.”

“Fuck, don’t leave.” Oops. That just slipped out.

“Ok. What should I do?”

You pull out your phone and put on some music that always makes you feel better after a strife with Bro. “Can we just, uh, sit here and listen for a while?”

“You want to get off the floor?”

You peek your head out from under the blanket. He’s looking down at you, looking genuinely concerned.

“No.” You pull the blanket back over your head and stick out your hand, thumping it against the couch.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“Hold my hand dude.”

You can practically hear Karkat raising his eyebrows, but a second later, you feel his fingers curl around yours.

“No, like this.” You peek out just enough to see to lace your fingers together. Unfortunately, his position sitting on the couch and you on the floor, it’s just not lining up. You groan, get up on your knees. 

He’s looking at you like you’ve just grown a second head. You pat his thigh. “Move over.”

“Dave, what the fuck?”

You make a frustrated sound. “Just—just— “

“Dave, what do you want from me? Alternia to Dave, I know you’re a little shaken up right now, but I can’t follow what you’re saying, and it’s not because I’ve suddenly lost all my brain cells. Just say what you want, and I’ll try to fucking deliver, ok?”

“I want to fuckin snuggle with you, ok?” It comes out much louder than you intended. Karkat blinks. Turns a little red. 

“Yeah, sure.”

You get to your feet, holding the blanket around you a second cape, and motion to Karkat to move.

“Um, how do you want to do this?” Karkat says.

You’re red, so red, but at least you’re not shaking as much.

“L-Let me lie down against the back, and you can…”

“Sounds good.” He stands, and you tumble onto the couch, smooshing your face into the plush, red back. Your shades smoosh against your face uncomfortably, but like hell are you taking them off. You pull the blanket up under your chin, and feel Karkat lift the other side.

The couch isn’t very wide, so he’s cuddled up close to you, full body, his face in your hair, chest against your back, pelvis to ass, feet to feet.

You’re so glad you did this before or you’d be flipping your shit. Especially about the dick to ass thing.

But.

You don’t feel a dick. 

You’re probably still just too riled up. 

You feel him exhale into your hair; it’s warm, it feels nice.

You feel the blanket move as he lifts an arm, hesitates, then puts it back down.

You thought he’d be more aggressive about this. 

Especially since he, y’know, likes you likes you.

“You can, y’know? P-put your arm around…”

Karkat laughs a little shakily. 

“You sure? You freaked out pretty bad last time I moved?”

“Trust me, bro, I’m not goin to fall asleep now.” He shifts, arm looping over your side, palm resting flat over your chest.

You focus on how warm it is. On how warm he is. His breath in your hair, his chest on your back, his hand on your chest.

It’s so much.

But in a good way. It's grounding. 

You feel safe.

Two songs in, you realize his chest is vibrating. If you listen really hard, you can hear a soft rumble, just barely audible over the music. 

You twist your head to look at him. “Uh, what’s that?”

“What’s wha—oh fuck, shit, fuck,” his voice is, there’s no better word for it, vibrating. The only thing you can think to compare it to would be if a cicada were able to talk and buzz at the same time. “I’m so fucking sorry Dave, I didn’t realize—I didn’t mean to— “

You mash your face back into the couch, because you know you’re going to blush. “Dude, chill. I kind of like it. It's…nice. Calmin.”

He gives a little, buzzy laugh. “It’s supposed to be, dipshit, it’s a pale vocalization.” 

“Does that mean— “

“That I’m feeling pale? Yes. This fuckery here, this shit, this is like straight out of a romance novel. Well, it would be, if we were talking about what just happened. Working it out and shit.”

“So, what, are we like, havin pale s-sex?”

Karkat’s hand thunks you lightly in the chest. “You can’t have pale sex, Dave, that’s kind of the whole point. It's conciliatory. And really most of the point of the pale quadrant is based around talking. This is just physical intimacy. It’s not emotional intimacy.”

It feels like a pretty fucking lot like emotional intimacy to you. You don’t say that though. Because saying that would make it even more intimate. 

“Can you, uh, give me a human equivalent here, bro?”

His head bumps against your neck. He sighs. “I don’t know. Making out maybe? Like a friends with benefits thing. If you say anything about this being gay, I’m fucking leaving you.”

“No, don’t.”

“Ok.” 

You stay like that for approximately twenty minutes. You know, because your playlist ends. Karkat buries his nose in the fuzz on the back of your neck, and rubs a little circle on your chest.

Then he stretches, the hand on your chest is gone, his back curves and cracks. He props himself up on one elbow and rests his other hand on your waist.

“How you feeling?”

You sigh. Bravo is usually your policy, but that’s over pesterchum. You don’t think you have it in you to fake it in your voice. Not with him so close to you. But honesty is a pretty good option in this case too.

“Better.”

“Mm, good,” Karkat says, thumb rubbing in small little swipes. You focus on that. 

There’s a honk, not too far away. You somehow go even more still, and Karkat’s hand freezes.

“While I’m all for cuddling more, for obvious reasons, can we move to a different location? Because— “

“Yes, fuck, absolutely.” 

The two of you are on your feet and have everything captchalogued in record time.

“Yours or mine,” You ask.

“Mine,” he says. “I have no doubt yours is an absolute disaster zone.”

You snicker. “You’re not wrong.”

He holds out his hand to you, and you just kind of stare at it. He raises an eyebrow.

“Come on,” he says, dropping his hand, and starting to walk away. 

You catch up to him in an instant, and takes his hand. He doesn’t look back at you, but he gives your hand a squeeze.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going on spring break soon, so if I don't get a lot of homework over it, I'm going to try to write more for this, maybe upd8ing twice over that week, what do you guys think?


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout out to my new beta Allen for fixing my atrocious spelling and grammar.

His room always feels sterile to you. It’s too clean. Absolutely no mess, everything in its proper place, aside from the most recent movie and novel resting on his desk and some posters not hung exactly parallel to the floor.

He doesn’t turn on the light when you walk into the room. Usually you’d bicker about how your diurnal eyes need at least a fucking weird ass bioluminescent grub lamp thing or something, but now you’re content to just bump into him when he stops. You hear the sound of him decaptchaloguing something, and then the skitter of his crabtop’s legs on the floor. The soft glow of the screen throws blurry shadows on the wall, and you have to actively fight the impulse to press closer to him.

The shadows move slowly though, in time with Karkat’s movements. There’s no flash stepping going on here, no imminent puppet beat downs in store.

It helps to know that if Karkat ever went whatever weird troll crazy some of the others did, you could beat his ass down so hard.

“I’m not a highblood, Dave,” Karkat says. “I’m not going to go into fucking murder mode. I know you didn’t know them, but look at the colors. Vriska was the lowest to flip her shit, and what color is she? Fucking blue! Now Dave, look at my eyes.” He takes a step closer to you, so much closer jesus fuck, his mouth is like two inches away from yours. He takes two fingers, and holds his eyelids wide open. “What color do you see? And don’t try to butter me up and say grey, because I check every goddamn day to see if the sludge trudging its putrefying way through the dumpster trails I call veins has decided to announce its fucking presence to the world and leak into my optical spheres. I know there are flecks of red in there.”

“Was I talking out loud again?” You voice definitely does not stutter and you are definitely not still shaken up.

Karkat heaves a huge sigh and throws his hands up in the air. “Dave, I don’t think you actually know how to think thoughts and keep them inside your thinkpan. Your brain to mouth filter is even thinner than mine, and that’s fucking saying something. But whatever. Apparently we’re doing the friends with benefits thing, so I’m not even going to open that can of dirt noodles.”

Friends with benefits? Friends with benefits? Wait, what? You can’t keep up and oh. Oh god. Karkat is taking off his shirt. Oh shit oh fuck, yes, you like snuggling him, yes, you’d probably like kissing him, but you are really not ready for, for, for this. You have no doubt that you are beet red (which is v gay, thanks brain, for supplying that information) which feels a little ridiculous because you’ve seen guys without shirts before. And sure, he’s got this weird ridge on his sides, but other than that, he’s just a normal, chubby, shirtless dude. You got this Dave, just play it cool.

“Uh.” You say.

He rolls his eyes, and his fingers reach down for the button of his jeans.

“What garish yellow earth bee has flown into your outlandish feminine headgear?” He unbuttons, unzips.

“Uh!” Real coherent, Dave. Really selling the whole cool kid act.

He starts pulling his pants down, and, you can’t take it anymore, you whirl around. You hear him curse and stumble, then the sound of shoes bouncing off something.

There’s silence for a long moment.

“Uh, Dave? I thought you wanted to continue our pale buddy escapades. With an e. Pale with an e. P-a-l-e oh fuck just cull me now, I didn’t, I mean, I do, but right now I just. Ughh!”

You turn around. Karkat his standing in just his underwear, which, are weird as fuck. They’re not boxers, and they’re not brief, they’re like, this tiny pair of shorts that might as well not even be shorts. Not that you’re looking or anything. And there’s uh. No sign of a dick. It should probably be falling out of underwear that short.

“This was fucking stupid, we should have just gone back to your block, you probably don’t even—oh god, you don’t even understand why I just stripped. How fucking pan rottingly dumb can you get Karkat? Oh god, past Karkat is a dunderfuck for not thinking about cultural differences, past Karkat got caught up in the magic and decided, hey! Guess what! Let’s just push it so hard that it all blows up in our face! Ha ha ha! Isn’t that a great idea! Past Karkat is an idiot, and I, current Karkat, humbly apologize for him thinking that you’d be down for traditional pale activities.”

You rock back on your heels and push your shades into your face with your palms. Your voice is coming out way too high, but you push through it. “What, uh, are traditional pale activities?”

He’s stooping, grabbing his turtle neck and shoving it back over his head. “You know,” he says, one nubby horn caught in the fabric, the other sticking out the neck hole. “Snuggling, forehead kisses, horn rubs, which, I guess we can improvise something else to go there because that’s kind of a big one.” His head pops though, and he pulls the sweater down. He looks up at you, more shyly than you’d thought he could—which, let’s be honest, is less than half a percent shy on the coy bullshitometer. “Talking about your Bro.” He turns around and bends over for his pants and hello, plush rump. 

A little voice in your head is chanting ‘you’re gay’ and you would kindly like to tell it to shut the fuck up, pack up its family, and move its shit trailer onto greener pastures, because you are having none of that crap here.

“So the stripping was for…?” you manage to ask.

He straightens back up. “For getting in the ‘coon. What did you think, we were going to snuggle and watch movies on the floor?”

“Oh,” is all you manage. Karkat’s got one leg in his pants. “Ok,” you say.

Karkat freezes, looks up at you. “Yeah?” he says.

“Yeah, sure, bro. I’m going to say one big, hulking no homo right now, such a big no homo that all other no homos will look at this no homo and be like aw no bitch, we looking like fucking gay ass sissy boys in comparison to that big, husky chunk of husky man meat. We better go crying home to our mamas and confesse to our raging desire to guzzle gobs of white hot semen down our dick-parched and starving throats. That’s how large, masculine, and pussy-loving this no homo is.”

Karkat steps out of his pants, and kicks them across the room. “I’m going to pretend I understood half of what you said, and take from that self-indulgent ramble that this is just your usual not a homosexual bullshit.”

He steps back a couple feet, steps quickly forward and hops, foot making the recooperacoon jiggle as it makes contact, and boosts himself up and into the slime neatly. Not a single splash, hardly even a ripple. He disappears under the surface for a moment before popping up again. He wipes slime out of his eyes and shivers.

“Hurry up and get in already. It’s not sopor, since we could never get the right kind of grist to make it, so it shouldn’t do anything funny to your feeble human mind. It’s not even a little bit sedating. Trust me, I’d fucking gargle with the stuff if it was.

You shift your weight from foot to foot. Then you grab your hood, and pull it and your cape off. You already feel kind of naked without your cape. When did it become such a part of you?

Karkat disappears under the surface again, for longer this time. Maybe he’s giving you privacy? Or maybe it’s just a troll thing. Fucking trolls do seem to love their slime. Whatever the reason, you shuck your shirt off, then your pants, thanking fuck that your god tier boxers are just the same red as the rest of your outfit, and you’re not wearing something so wonderfully ironic that it would just go so far over Karkat’s head that you’d end up being called stupid.

Karkat resurfaces, draping his slimy arms over the side of the ‘coon. You try very, very hard not to notice he just looked you up and down. You fail to not notice. You notice a lot, actually. And your face is probably as red as your boxers.

‘You’re fucking gay,” says the little voice. You smother it with what’s left of your dignity. 

“So,” you say. “How do I get in?”

Karkat moves to the far side of the opening. “I don’t know, douchepod, you just jump in.”

You attempt to do what Karkat did, just kind of bouncing in. Instead you go bouncing off. Karkat howls with laughter. It does nothing to help your shattered cool factor, but the awkwardness surrounding the situation is helping to abate the adrenaline rush you got from thinking about Bro earlier.

You cheat. Karkat call you out on it loudly, but really, you had to die to get awesome floaty powers, so is it really cheating to choose to use them?

Your toe touches the slime, and man, is it gross. And cold. You notice Karkat is shivering a little bit.

“You sure this is safe man? Where did you even fucking get this slime?”

“It’s just slime, Dave, get the fuck in already.”

You slowly lower yourself down, and sit on the rim, legs up to the knee in slime. It’s cold, so cold, how is Karkat standing it? You kick your leg a little, and the slime resists, making your movement slow. Karkat doesn’t seem hindered by it. 

There’s not much space in the opening, so Karkat is kind of forced to be all up in your business. He takes it farther- he rests his arms on both your legs, and lets his head lean against the inside of your left thigh.

And fuck, his face is like three inches away from your dick. Your heart jackhammers.

“Dude,” you say, voice tight, “I know I said I was going to say the biggest no homo and then shut up about it, but can your please not get in prime blow job position during our weird snuggle fest.”

“What’s a blow job?” he asks, curious, innocent.

Oh fuck.

You push your shades more firmly onto your face, study the ceiling. “Y’know bro, a blow job, a bj, oral, do trolls not have oral sex?”

“What the fuck do you even mean by oral sex? Are you talking about making out? Of course trolls have making out; I know you’ve seen Rose and Kanaya at it, we’ve all seen them at it.”

You make a frustrated noise. You can’t believe you’re going to explain oral sex to an alien. But you know you have to, he won’t stop pushing until you do.

“Dave,” he says, annoyed, as he looks up at your under long, long lashes. Ugh, stop, brain, stop.

“Y’know,” you say.

“You’re not being very helpful Dave.”

“It’s, ok, this is going to sound super unsexy, but I swear, blow jobs are great, not that I’ve ever given one—I mean got one! Got one! Why the fuck would I give one? No reason, because I wouldn’t, ever, that’s why. Ok, uh, right, where was I?”

“Blow jobs.”

“Right, giving blow jobs. It’s pretty much what it sounds like, but sexier. It’s when—oh god I can’t believe trolls don’t give blow jobs—basically it’s when you put a dick in your mouth and suck it.”

Karkat pulls a classic Karkat face, simultaneously jerking away from you like your terminal and contagious. 

“That is fucking disgusting, Dave! That is so unsanitary, and disgusting, and fuck, I don’t even have words for how fucked up that is. It’s like if fucked up was a car, bulldozing down a highway at top speed, crashing into all the other fucked up cars and gathering them into itself to form one huge, rolling boulder of fucked up automobile parts, that steamrolls everything in its way until it eventually becomes so large that it knocks the planet out of its gravitational pull and sends everything careening to its death in the nearest sun.”

You take him retreating to the other side as a chance to slide all the way in, and fuck, you’re going to freeze your dick off. There it goes, scrunching up closer to your body, trying to conserve warmth. Karkat is still going.

“Not to mention dangerous! Who would be stupid enough to let someone near their junk with their teeth. Have you seen troll teeth, Dave? Have you seen Terezi’s teeth? Or Kanaya’s. You are just asking for trouble; your bulge would get sliced to ribbons. Gee, what a great idea! Let’s put fangs near bulges. Dave, be honest, if I right now, was like, ‘hey! Let me give you a blow job, no strings attached’ would you honestly let your human dick get destroyed like that?”

“Yes.” Fuck. “No! I mean. You don’t have scary troll teeth like the others, your teeth are fucking normal and nubby like human teeth, so it would probably be fine. So like, in theory, if you were a chick, I would be like, oh yeah babe, get your hot mouth all over my man meat, but since you’re not, I’m going to, unfortunately—fuck—I mean, yeah, no. No blow jobs tonight.”

Karkat blinks.

“I will shut up for the rest of the night if you promise to not tell Rose any of what just happened here.”

“Does that mean we’re not going to talk about your Bro.”

“Yes.”

He makes a frustrated Karkat sound. It’s a little growly, and you know it’s supposed to be intimidating, but it’s just cute.

“Fine. Here I am offering up my astounding knowledge of how to be a great moirail and support the fuck out of you, but you just want to use me for my body. What the fuck ever, just come here already.”

You hope that’s just dramatics, and he doesn’t think you’re, y’know, actually using him. You try to move towards him, and find you don’t know how to move in slime.

He rolls his eyes, and moves towards you instead, not that there’s more than a few inches separating you.

His arms go around your neck and he somehow pushes down on you, until your feet hit the floor. When he eases up you go back to floating, but you feel like you could actually reach the bottom on your own now.

He moves again, hoisting himself up over the ledge, ass literally smearing slime down the sides of your shades.

You hear a movie start up, and he slides back in. And then immediately slides up against you.

You know Karkat runs hotter than you do, but in this freezing slime, he feels ten times warmer. He’s got his arms around your neck, his chest against your chest, and holy shit, he’s trying to work a leg between your legs, abort, fucking abort.

“Wait!” you say, and he immediately freeze. “Uh, this is good, let’s just keep it here.”

“I thought you were done with the no homoing, oh my fucking god, you said you were going to shut up.”

“No, no, I am, just the whole, the tangling legs, y’know, getting your thigh action all intimate with my crotch, that is a very sexual thing on Earth, and I just, that’s going to be a no.” Part of you is cursing you for speaking up. It’s a large part of you. You smother it too.

Karkat flushes. “Oh, yeah, uh, that’s weird, but ok.” You feel the slime shift as he readjusts his legs away from you.

You both kind of float awkwardly for a moment.

“You sure you don’t want to talk, Dave?”

“I’m not allowed to talk, remember?”

“Ugh. Here, then.” He grabs you by the shoulder, and pushes you against the other side of the ‘coon, sidling up next to you. Thanks to his familiarity with navigating slime, he actually floats a couple inches higher than you, and he uses that to his advantage, throwing an arm around you.

The slime warms as the movie plays. You inch closer to Karkat, who doesn’t seem to mind. Of course he doesn’t mind, you think, he likes this. He’s ok with liking this. You take a deep breath, readjust your shades, and pull yourself around to the front of him, linking your arms around his neck and pressing your chest up against his.

He grunts, gets a hand on your waist (which does not make the skin there feel tingly) and another on the back of your head, and adjusts you so your face is pressed against his neck, assumingly so he can keep watching the movie.

His fingers move slowly through your hair, massaging at your scalp. Your hair is going to be full of slime, gross.

It feels nice though. You’re warm. You’re getting attention. Someone cares about you enough to take care of you. To do the stupid stuff your weak for needing. What would Bro think, if he saw you now? Snuggled up, basically naked with another boy.

He’d beat your ass so hard.

You grimace, and press your face further into Karkat’s neck. He starts making that bizarre purring noise, and you focus on that, until it’s all you can hear, until it’s all you can think about. Just Karkat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Its still basically sunday, right? only 20 minutes past midnight. Sorry, I got so caught up in my homestuck reread that I forgot to post earlier


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm late everyone, I was exhausted yesterday, pretty much just woke up to go to work, then went back to bed as soon as it was over.

You don’t know how long you’ve been in this slime. The movie’s been off for a while, and Karkat’s retreated under the not sopor. He offered you one of the weird gas-mask like rebreathers he uses to not suffocate under the slime, and while you took it just in case, there’s no way you’re going under.

There’s no way you’re falling asleep either. 

You’ll admit, for cuddling purposes, slime is pretty great. Solid eight out of ten. Mandatory skin to skin contact. Check. No one’s arms going numb from being laid on too long. Check. Ease of sustained, full body contact. Check.

If you could bring blankets, it would get a ten. Its warmed up now, but just to body temperature, and you’d like to be a little cozier thanks. That, and you don’t think you can actually sleep in it. It’s just too…unnatural.

And you’re really getting tired. You think you might just. Get out. Yeah. Get out and go back to your room and go to sleep, as great as Karkat being wrapped around your chest is.

You shift lightly, ready to pry Karkat’s hands off of you. But to your surprise, he goes with only the slightest hint of you pushing him away. Then he’s surfacing. Oh shit, did you wake him up?

He rips off his mask as he rests back against the ‘coon’s rim. “Sorry, was I being too clingy?”

Your face heats, because that is the opposite of a problem. “Aw, no bro, I’m sorry, I didn’t want to, y’know, wake you up.”

“I wasn’t asleep.”

“Huh?”

He folds in on himself a little, runs a hand through his hair, pushing his bangs over his forehead. They stay that way, slime acting as a weird, bright green hair gel. It’s cute.

No, fuck, bad Dave.

“I wasn’t asleep. I don’t sleep.”

“How can you not sleep? Bro, that doesn’t seem very healthy.”

He stares up at the ceiling. “I know, I just—” He sighs. “Getting into it while in this intimate of a setting would have some pretty pale ramifications that I’m personally comfortable with, but I know you’re not—even if you say you are Dave, I know you’re not. I’m not even sure you can understand the nuances of pale romance; humans aren’t built the same way. And while you might be cool with me just spilling my bright red guts all over the place in the name of your human emotion of friendship, I would like to save my, well. Fuck. My first time with someone who actually gives a fuck. Like, the physical stuff, who cares, call me easy, I don’t give a fuck. But the feelings jam. That I’m hesitant to just, well, yeah.”

Fuck. He does think you’re just using him for the snuggles. And. It hurts that he’s not wrong. Wait wait, that sounds horrible, he’s your friend and you love him and—wait fuck, back up, what did you just think? You didn’t think that right, there’s no way you thought that right.

Bury it and move on, Dave.

“I uh. I don’t want you to think I’m like. Taking advantage of you. Even though now that you put it that way, if feels kind of like I am, and I suddenly feel hella dirty about this, oh my god, I’m like running your pale bases and you’re letting me. All for the sake of some stupid maybe thing I have, and god, fuck, why don’t you just— “

“Dave, if you don’t stop rambling I will shooshpap you, and if you want to talk about pale moves, that would be a big one to make.”

“Ok, ok, I’ll just, shut up then.”

You both just look at each other for a long moment. You try to wipe some slime off your shades, but it just makes it worse.

“You don’t have to stay,” Karkat says. “I figured you wouldn’t. Humans don’t sleep in recooperacoons, and you’re probably tired. So. Don’t let me keep you here.”

You want to go back to your mattress. You don’t want to go alone. Maybe you’ll luck out and a future you will be there to snuggle you. 

“Yeah bro, sorry, I can’t sleep in the slime. I’m gonna go hit the hay. And by hay I mean sweet sweet box springed wonderland.” Play it cool, Dave, c’mon. Just play it cool and don’t be a fag about it. “You can come, if you want.”

Karkat perks up, and you feel like you’re leading him on. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to. To. To talk to him a little. He didn’t watch you grow up like Terezi did, at least you don’t think, so maybe you could just fill him in a little bit.

Ugh, but that would still be like, what? Pale flirting, flirting that you’re not able to back up. Imitating feelings you don’t understand to make him happy.

Are you still seriously pretending you don’t have a crush on him? Even at the cost of hurting him?

That thought makes your heart ache.

“Ablutions first,” Karkat says, already climbing out of the ‘coon. You get a nice view of his ass as he climbs out, not that you were uh, staring or anything. It was just right there. Right, Dave, c’mon, get a hold of yourself.

You float yourself out, most of the slime sliding off your body and back into the ‘coon, but you’re still largely covered. You touch down on the ground and Karkat squawks at you for leaving green footprints on his clean floor.

“The mat is right there Dave, it’s right fucking there! You couldn’t do me the honor of wiping off your walking stubs before leaving trails of sopor imitation all over my floor? Or, I don’t know, just float to the ablution block?”

“Sorry.” You float yourself two inches from the floor as Karkat fusses with cleaning up the slime. You try really, really hard to keep your eyes off him, but there are only so many stupid movie posters to glance at, and Karkat is mesmerizing and basically naked. 

When he stands up and turns to face you, he opens his mouth to say something, but stops. And this devious little smirk appears on his face. A smirk you’ve never seen on him before but hope to see a million times more because damn, is that attractive. You mean, uh, no, you’re going to stick with attractive for that one. Because wow.

“Dave?”

“Yeah?” You’re voice cracks. Stupid puberty. So uncool.

“You’re checking me out.”

“What, no!”

“What, yes!”

“No man, I just— “

“Oh yeah, let me see you try to explain this away.”

You’re reeling, and his grin is getting wider and damn that’s hot. Um. You mean, uh, fuck. Oh fuck, no. Shit. Get yourself out of this, Dave. 

“Just doing some studying in the alien physiology department. Y’know, scribbling down what’s the same, what’s different. Getting my motherfucking science pants on. What are those things on your sides man, they look weird as fuck.”

He laughs. “Ok, Dave, sure, you want to play scienterrorist, I’ll be your willing alien patient. Let me walk you through this, troll biology for dipshits, aka you. These are my grubscars,” he says, gesturing to the weird almost black protrusions on his lower rib cage. “They’re vestigial legs from my wrigglerhood.” He taps hard on the middle of one. “Not very much feeling. Some people get them engraved or pierced or whatever. Here, look.” He steps closer to you, takes your hand, and guides it inches away from his grubscar. Your mouth feels dry and your face feels hot. You’re standing way too close. 

This feels charged. There’s this tension between you. Karkat is pushing in a whole different way from before. Somewhere deep within you, you figure this is probably what he meant by liking you red, but not knowing which. Before had felt platonic.

This.

This feels.

This feels like when you made out with yourself. This feels. Sexual.

You can’t. You want to but you can’t. 

“Karkat— “ 

Something in your tone makes his face crumble, but only for a second, before it’s back to its normal scowl. He pulls away.

“Sorry, that was stupid, I was being stupid.” He gives a laugh that probably isn’t intended to be bitter. “Fuck, well, I’ve always known that Past Karkat is an idiot, a bulge-chafing, chute-stuffing embarrassment to trollkind. Hell, look, even Present Karkat— “

“Karkat, shut the fuck up.”

“Oh, don’t bait me like this, Strider. I know, and you know, and I know that you know that this is where I’m supposed to say ‘make me’ and the sexual tension becomes so great between up that one of us can’t take it anymore and we finally kiss!” His voice is amping itself up, his gestures getting bigger, the space between you getting wider. And then he deflates. “But we both know that’s not going to happen. And I just, don’t want to deal with that right now. So fine, I’ll shut up, stop my self-derivative bullshit, stop flirting, just stop.” He turns away from you, pulls at his hair before ruffling it up again. “I just don’t know how to stop, that’s always my problem.”

“Karkat,” you try again.

“What?”

“I’m um.” C’mon, Dave, c’mon. “I’m not asking you to stop.” Fuck, no, damn it.

“What?” He’s turned to face you again, arms crossed.

“I’m not asking, you can keep. Y’know. I don’t mind.” Ugh, stupid, why can’t you say what you want to say?

“Dave, if the point of the rant was a target, you just missed it so spectacularly that your arrow flew right back around and pierced you in your own neck. It’s pretty impressive, I’d clap but I am so utterly unamused by this conversation. Can we please just move the fuck on, I’m freezing.”

“Yeah ok. Which way to the showers?”

“Ablution chambers you mean.”

“Yeah whatever, let’s just go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> man these boys are awkward I love them


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is not a happy chapter

Karkat does not reach for your hand before you leave the room. That’s cool, you need to grab your clothes, and he’s probably doing the same thing. Your hands both have business to attend to.

But he doesn’t grab your hand after that. Not even when he opens the door, or when he starts leading the way down the hallway. He doesn’t even make a move to reach for you hand. You were looking for it, and damn, there was nothing in that department.

Is…is this what stop flirting means? No more little touches? Is he going to stop sitting so close to you on movie nights? Not brush your fingers together while passing cans, or elbowing you over to get to the grub sauce?

What about the one time, a couple weeks ago, when he’d tackled you? You thought about it almost constantly for days. You had been arguing over something stupid, and he’d threatened to do it. You mocked him, and he did.

He ended up on top of you, jabbing fingers into your sides and making you laugh and laugh. No one had ever tickled you before, and it was kind of fun. It sounds horrible in theory, having someone physically on top of you, forcing involuntary spasms and laughs out of you, with you completely at their mercy. It sounds like the stuff out of nightmares. But when it's someone you like, you guess that makes all the difference. God, Karkat’s so great. You wish he’d hold your hand again. That would be great.

He just walks a little faster in front of you, down past a couple doors, and into the third one. He doesn’t hold it open for you. Rude. 

You put your hand over the handprint he left, about to push the door open when it hits you.

You just thought that you liked Karkat. And didn’t freak out about it. The stomach twisting disgust is settling in now, but it wasn’t before. When you were just daydreaming, you were fine.  
So basically, you’re cool with being a fag, as long as you don’t think about it too hard.

Ugh, bad choice of words. You guess it might be a good idea to get that out of your vocabulary. Just thinking of yourself as a fag makes you sick, makes you scream the Egbertian phrase you’ve been clinging to so hard: ‘I am not a homosexual’. 

You guess you’re still not a homosexual. You still like girls. You had your weird crush on Jade, and that crush on Terezi that she shut the hell down once you met in person. That didn’t stop being a thing just because you realized that you…like…Karkat.

Said troll then opens the door in his signature, full-force assault way, and it hits you so hard in the face that you go sprawling back onto your ass. Your hands fly to your shades, making sure they’re not cracked, even as you feel blood start to seep out your nose.

“Oh my god,” Karkat says, loud as ever. “Oh my god, oh my god, you’re bleeding, and it's red, oh my god, I mean, of course it’s red, but, you’re bleeding, holy shit, oh my god, I did that, are you ok? Are you ok? Dave! Dave?”

Yeah, there was no way you were going to get a word in edgewise while he was winding up. 

“Dude, chill. It's fine.” You pinch your nose, and shit, that stings. There’s blood running between your fingers now. Gross. “I don’t think it hurts enough to be broken.” That’s bs, your pain tolerance is really high. It didn’t start that way, but Bro sure as hell made sure it ended up there. And then you fucking died. Twice. So. This barely registers.

“Oh fuck, you’re bleeding a lot. That’s a lot of blood.”

You can feel blood running down your neck now. You get the sudden mental image of that one doomed Dave, neck slit, dying beside your quest bed.

Ok. 

That’s a thing. 

A thing you’re going to move on from and not think about. Karkat’s freaking out, you need to take care of that.

“Karkat, Karkat, chill. I’m ok, I’m fine. I’m goin to take care of this, you just sit tight here, ok? That’s a bathroom, right?”

“Yeah.” He’s doing that thing he does, gesturing wildly with his hands. Breathing fast. You remember Vriska making fun of him for getting upset over blood. You always assumed it was over his own, but maybe it’s just blood in general?

You let go of your nose and push yourself to your feet. Ugh, you feel some of it drip onto your chest. “Just chill here, ok, bro?”

He nods at you, and you push open the door. It’s one of the typical bathrooms in the meteor. Large, communal. You get a wad of toilet paper and shove it against your nose.

You stand in front of one of the mirrors. 

Wow, you’re a mess. And you mean more than just emotionally. You look like fucking Christmas up in here, drenched in green slime and dripping red blood everywhere. You soak through the toilet paper in record time, so you switch over to paper towels.

The door creaks open behind you, and Karkat slips inside.

“Dave?”

“Bro, I got this, you can just wait outside. I know you got a problem with blood, which, is pretty funny because you’re a blood player, y’know? But like, them’s the breaks with this game? But while you’re here, you gotta tell me, I look like motherfuckin Christmas, don’t I? Most festive Christmas I’ve ever had. All I need is some fuckin snow and I’ll be Santa!”

“I don’t have a problem with blood,” he says, coming up to stand next to you. He clearly does though, he won’t stop looking at yours. “Well, I guess I do a little, when it’s my blood, but I’m pretty much over that. It’s just, really fucking weird seeing someone else bleed the same color as me. Which probably doesn’t make any sense to you. But, ugh, I just meant to come in and say I’m sorry. But really, what the fuck were you doing just standing in front of the door?”

“Uh,” you say. Now’s the time Dave, drop it like it's hot. “I was just,” wait, fuck, that wouldn’t be romantic at all. Karkat would probably hate it if you told him while covered in blood and slime. “I was just zoning out.”

“For like ten minutes? Smack in front of the door?”

“Dude, I’ve been up for like twenty hours, I’m tired.”

“Weak,” he says.

“Oh yeah,” you say, switching to a new paper towel wad, “How long have you been awake for, bigshot?”

“About two weeks. Give or take a day or two.” 

“Karkat, what the fuck?” You knew he had insomnia. You know he had killer bags under his eyes. But that. That is ridiculous. 

He rubs at his temples. “I know, I know. Terezi gave me shit for it during the game. Said I was going to shorten my already pitifully short lifespan. But shit needed to get done, and no one else was stepping forward to do it. And before you ask, yes, I was this ornery before the game, when I was sleeping like a normal troll.”

You latched on to a completely different part of that. “Pitifully short lifespan? I thought trolls live like, centuries.” 

Karkat gives a barking laugh. “All the ones you know will. Except me. I’m a wild card, because, mutant, remember. We all live different lengths, based on blood color. Vriska, even if she wasn’t immortal, would live the longest. Then Terezi, then Kanaya. They’re mid and high bloods.”

“And you’re...?”

He huddles in on himself, digging his face into his turtleneck a little bit. It would be cute if he didn’t look so sad.

“A mutant. And I run hot. Hotter than a rust blood—which is the lowest. They live like a dozen or two sweeps, so probably less than that for me. At least nine, that’s how old my fucking dancestor was. Vriska’s dancestor said that he lived to adulthood—which is about ten— on Alternia before he was killed, so, I don’t know. It’s all borrowed time. I should have been culled at hatching.”

You do the conversions in your head. He’s 14 now, which is like, 6.5 sweeps? So, 12 would be 26? 

“Holy shit.” You drop your paper towel wad and turn to him. “You’re only going to live to be 26?”

He laughs. “There’s no way I’m going to live to 26 sweeps, Dave.”

“Longer than 26 years though, right.”

He rolls his eyes, “You’re 14 years, right?” He asks, and you nod. “So yeah, 26 human years best, is my guestimate.” 

Your brain stalls. You don’t think there’s ever been a moment where nothing runs through your mind. Well, you guess the fact that nothing running through your mind counts as something running through your mind, but just, Jesus, fuck.

Your nose is still bleeding and you’re covered in slime but you throw yourself at him, hugging him as tightly as you're able. He’s still for a moment, before hesitantly hugging you back.

“Uh, Dave, you’re kind of freaking me out here.”

“That’s too short,” you mumble into his sweater.

“Uh, Dave?”

You pull away, stuffing a new batch of paper towel up your nose. You got blood and slime on his sweater, but he doesn’t seem to care. 

“That’s too short,” you say, pushing your shades further into your face with your free hand.

“Not really,” he says. “Most of my race dies before 30 sweeps. And like I said, I’m lucky that I’ve even made it this far. I actually have a better fucking chance with the game, isn’t that sad? In the infinitesimally small chance we win this thing, I might be able to live my full lifespan. On Alternia I’d definitely be dead by 21 years. How long do humans live?”

“I don’t know. ‘Till they’re old? Like 70-90 years. Which is like 30-40 sweeps.”

You’re gripping the sink rather hard. Karkat seems to notice this. His hand hovers by yours, like he wants to take it, but instead he crosses his arms over his chest and takes a step back.

“You’re worried about outliving me.”

“You’re my best bro.”

“You’ll have everyone else. You’re immortal anyway. You were always going to outlive me. You’ll still have Rose, and John, and Jade. Kanaya is undead so she’ll be around. Vriska is immortal too. Terezi has a good couple centuries. You’ll be ok.”

“You don’t know that. I’m still— “you gesture to yourself, “I’m still growin up. I’ve grown two inches this year. My voice is changin; I’m goin through puberty. Conditional immortality probably doesn’t include age.”

He groans and pulls at his face. “Dave, lifespan bullshit doesn’t even matter right now. Because newsflash, most probable outcome? The one that’s most likely to happen? Is that we’re all dead in two years. We still have no leads on beating Jack other than siccing Jade on him. And bigger than that, Lord English? The guy who’s double killing ghosts? No clues at all there. Nothing! At all! So we can pout around and mope over our deaths, or we can enjoy our time on this god forsaken rock, and hope the people smarter than us figure out a plan. I don’t know about you, but I’m going with the second one.”

“Yeah.” You say. You pull away the paper towel, and this one comes away clean. You turn to Karkat, and lean against the wall. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m goin to go wash all this off now. Give me a sec.”

He nods as you jump into one of the communal showers. You turn the water on and take off your slime soaked boxers. You captchalogue them for later. Shit, do you have clean boxers on you? You don’t think you do. You’ll have to figure that out.

You have no soap or shampoo on you, so you just scrub with water, and it seems to work well enough. But god, 26 years? That’s hardly anything. That means his life is already half over. How can he be ok with that? You’re not ok with that. Jesus. Ok, Dave. Just. Make the most of your time with him. And that means doing what you want to do. What you know he wants to do.

You gotta look this gay thing in the mouth and then kiss it. God, what the fuck does that even mean? What the fuck do you even think sometimes?

But yeah. Enough burying this. You’ve got to tell him. 

“Karkat?” you call out.

“Yeah?” he says.

“Do you have a towel?”

God damn it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> now that you all probably hate me for giving kk such a short lifespan, please stick around while I figure out what to do with it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it get's better I promise. also sorry its so short and late

He gives you a towel. You ask him to turn around so you don’t soak your pants in the shower stall. You poke your head out and find him dutifully turned, so you dart out and pull on your god tier pants as fast as possible without falling over. You are really, really not comfortable going commando, but you are going to have to, god damn it. Your dick is going to be flopping around and it’s going to suck. A quick glance at his ass—back, at his back—reveals that he’s changed clothes. You pull on your undershirt, and tell him to turn around.

He does, and his eyes linger on your chest. Your undershirt is a lot tighter than the overshirt. You laugh nervously, but wink at him. Show him you’re interested. 

He doesn’t react.

Fuck, your shades.

You pull on the rest of your god tier ensemble. 

“C’mon,” you say. “Still down for snuggles in my block?”

“I thought you were tired?”

“We can snuggle until we fall asleep, bro.” You actively concentrate on not blushing as you hold out your hand.

Karkat looks unamused down at your hand, then back up at you. He brushes past you, out of the bathroom.

You suddenly feel like your whole being has bottomed out. Did he just reject you? You thought he liked you. He told you he liked you. What did you do wrong?

You exit the bathroom after him, and he starts leading the way to your room. He doesn’t talk, doesn’t fall in line with you easily the way you normally do. His back is tense; his hands are in fists. What are you doing wrong?

He likes you red doesn’t he? C’mon Dave, what does that mean? Heart and diamond. That’s the love one and the romantic bros one right? Ok, so you just did the bros one right? You just had a very emotional talk, with some hugging, and now he’s pissed at you. So maybe you did the wrong one. Maybe he’s feeling the love one. You need to flirt more sexually. 

You don’t know how to do that. You don’t know how to flirt at all.

Oh god, you’re going to fuck this up. You’ve been gay for like half an hour and you’re already failing so hard at it.

Why didn’t you practice flirting with yourself? That should have been step one. But no, you thought with your dick and immediately went to makeouts. How are you going to make out with him if he doesn’t want to make out with you? You’re not, that’s what.

“Dave, what the fuck are you mumbling about now?”

Oh fuck.

“Nothing!”

Damn it. 

“You’ve been acting weird as fuck the last couple of days. Is this some kind of human puberty thing? Because really, this is weirder than that thing your voice does sometimes. Though that weird high pitch thing it does is kind of cu—colossally annoying.”

“Uh. It actually kind of is a weird human puberty thing, bro.”

“Gross. Human puberty is so weird. Why do you do it slowly over time? It’s so much more efficient to just molt. One week of hibernation, and then boom, adulthood welcomes you into its loving and capable arms as one of its own.”

“This isn’t somethin that happens when you're sleeping. Well, um, I guess it could happen when your sleep, y’know, you wake up in the middle of the night in boner city after having a partially hot and heavy dream, motor runnin. You barely recall what you were dreamin about other than that it was steamy shit. So you groan and grab some lotion and tissues and you get to work beatin the meat, trying to remember anythin more about the dream. You’re jackin and jackin and then it hits you like a motherfuckin truck that it’s your best bro’s face in the dream, and then you orgasm spectacularly, get jizz on your face because you forgot about the tissue in your shame. And so you wipe your spunk off your face and change your clothes and try to get back to sleep, but you can’t because the fuckin thoughts won’t go away, and you stay up all night, just thinkin and thinkin, and. Yeah. Does that make sense?” 

You reach your door and push it open, stepping inside.

Karkat blinks at you. “Has this, uh, actually happened to you, Dave?”

“No.” You say it way too fast.

“Oooookay. Maybe I should let you sleep, you’re getting weird, even for you. That was the longest slip in a while.”

You take a deep breath, grab his hand and yank him inside, closing the door swiftly behind him.

He looks up at you, eyebrows furrowed. 

“That’s because. Uh. Hnn. It wasn’t a slip.”

“Ok.” He says. Damn. Why is this so hard? You toe your shoes off and drop onto your mattress. He does the same. Only on the opposite side from you. He usually sits so close. There’s so much space.

“I uh…hnn.” 

Karkat just sits quietly. It’s so unlike him. 

“I— “like you. I like you. C’mon, just say it. “Can we snuggle?” you ask instead. But hey, at least it's progress.

Karkat shifts away from you. “I think that would probably be a bad idea.”

You stall. Wasn’t he…down for this? Are you misinterpreting all this? Does he not like you anymore? Like, not even as a friend?

“Oh. Ok.”

There’s an awkward silence.

You’ve got to do something.

“Can we like, talk, Karkat?”

He sighs. “I’m sorry,” he says.

“What?”

“I know I’m acting weird. But I don’t know how else to fucking act. It’s just. So hard. I didn’t think it would be this hard. And you’re just fucking making it harder. Maybe it would be best to just, give each other some space. Not talk for a couple weeks.”

No. No no no no why is everything going wrong?

“Yeah, that, that’s probably best. I’ll…see you in a bit, Dave.”

He starts to get up. Fuck.

“Karkat!” you say, desperate. “I um. I hnn. Oh fuck, why can’t I say it. I make a million Freudian slips but I can’t just fuckin say it.”

“Look Dave— “he goes on but you don’t catch what he’s saying. Future you just appeared, standing behind Karkat, with a sign that says ‘get your mack on’. And now he’s gone. 

Well. Can’t say no to a sign like that.

You stand up. “Karkat, you can go, if you want to, but before that, can I just do one thing?”

His whole body moves as he signs. “Yeah sure, Dave, go for it.”

You step forward, put your hand on his cheek. Lean in.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“Uh. Exactly what it looks like?”

“What it looks like is pity kisses. But not the good kind of pity. The shitty, not romantic kind you give the joke character to get their hopes up before you cull them. And I fucking know I’m the joke character, but could we not act out this one shitty trope please? Besides, you don’t even like boys.”

“I like you.” Oh my god. 

His eyes widen. 

“I said it,” you say. “I said it, I said it!”

“You…like me? But you’re not human gay.”

“I’m not. I still like girls. But I’d like to. Hnn. I’d like to. Um.”

His hands find their way to your waist, and it feels like magic.

“Like to what, exactly?” he asks, face cracking into that attractive, attractive smile. 

He’s teasing you. He’s flirting with you.

He smiles wider. “You’re only now getting that?”

“Shit, did I say that out loud?”

“What do you think?”

“Fuck.”

He laughs softly. “C’mere.”

You go eagerly, bending over as he rises to tip toes. You lips meet. His are soft, and he kisses you softer. It only lasts a couple seconds before he’s pulling away. You feel breathless anyway.

“Mmm, that was a freebee.” Karkat says. “If you want another, you’ll have to pay for it.”

“I’m like mad rich, bro, name your price.”

“A date.”

“Done. Can we snuggle and maybe…do that some more?”

“Duh.”

You grab his around the middle and tip the both of you over onto the mattress. He laughs as you bounce and come together. You lay there, forehead to forehead, breathing each other’s air.

It only last for a moment. “Let me get the lights,” he says.

Once they’re off, you captchalogue your shades. He eases back onto the mattress and seeks out your lips. You slot your legs together, arms thrown over each other as you kiss. His hand smooths over your jawline, the side of your face.

“No shades?” he says.

“Nah.” You reply. 

“I’m honored,” he says.

You kiss him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> annnd they finally kiss. But we're not out of the woods yet. I've got one more chapter backlogged, but after that, it might take me awhile. Its coming up on the end of my senior semester for college, and I have a lot of writing I have to do for school that takes priority. Not to mention I haven't updated my other fics for like half a year. It might be time to take a break here for a little bit and work on the others. We'll see. More on that next week.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this has been written and edited and sitting on my computer for like 6 months I'm so sorry

You fall asleep with Karkat two inches from your lips. 

You wake up in a dream bubble alone. You sit up, rub your head, hug yourself. You did it. You kissed him. Multiple times. Sure, you feel sick to your stomach, because kissing boys is wrong and disgusting, but it was also wonderful.

You want to do it again. And again. 

But.

You flop back onto your back, stare up at the gears and lavafalls of your planet while your back presses into the grit of the roof.

But ‘waking up’ in this position, on this roof, well, it brings back memories of ass kickings. Ass kickings that you’d be sure to be in for if Bro was still alive. Ass kickings that you deserve more than normal.

Ugh. Maybe you’ll just. Lie here. Hope nobody comes. Try to puzzle out how to feel about this. Because two minutes ago everything was wonderful. One minute ago, it was wonderful 70%, horrible 30%. And, since the Bro thoughts, you’re down to wonderful 10 and horrible 90.

You smoosh your shades into your face with both palms, and just, nngh. Why does everything have to be such a federal fucking issue? Why can’t you just have a crush like a normal kid and not get fifty kinds of messed up about it? What’s so broken with you? You have a date. With a…person…you like. You should be excited!

You just feel like throwing up. You feel like crying. You feel like shoving your sword through your own dream torso.

Then there is something on your torso. A literal crushing weight instead of this bullshit emotional one. You crane your neck up to find a sleepy Karkat half slung over you. His horn is digging into your neck, but he’s moving now, rolling off you.

“Guess I actually fell asleep. Wow.”

“Congrats dude.”

“Thanks,” he grunts. “I still feel like shit though, which is fucking bull. I’m asleep, I shouldn’t feel this exhausted. I’d be afraid I was dead, except I can vividly remember the events that took place before drifting off to the dream bubbles.” He pats the roof a couple times with his hand, looking for yours. When he finds it, he takes a hold of it, give it a little squeeze. 

You heart can’t decide whether it should soar or sink. It tries to do both and its painful. You lock your jaw and keep your face straight. You don’t otherwise respond.

He lets go of your hand. “Uh, fuck, I just kind of assumed you were alpha Dave and that we had just, y’know, well, you don’t know, and I’m not going to go into the details of it because that’s kind of personal between me and alpha Dave.”

“I am alpha Dave dumbass.”

“Oh. Then let me guess; you’re having second thoughts because you’re hung up about it being gay.”

You make a pained noise and nod.

“I kind of figured you’d regret it, and we’d go into awkwardly avoiding each other for the rest of our time on this stupid hunk of space rock. Well, now’s as good a time as— “

You don’t think. You just grab his hand as he starts getting up. “Don’t go.”

He makes a frustrated growl. “I’m getting real tired of you jerking me around, Dave. God, fuck, now I know how Terezi must have felt with me, and its fucking terrible. I just feel like one of the fucking roe cubes I used to feed my lusus, put through an emotional grinder, only to be put back together into a neat little cube, but oh no, not done yet, still have to be put through the blast chiller that is trying to talk about feelings with Dave Strider. I was trying to say earlier; I’m done with this. I’m done with this empty flirting. Find somebody else to throw your on again off again feelings at.”

He sits up to get up, but you’re faster than him. You throw yourself onto his lap, straddling him, hands heavy on his shoulders. Your foreheads slam together in the flurry of movement. His hands fly to his, but you grit your teeth and endue the pain, holding your position. 

“Dave, what the taint chafing ever loving fuck are you doing?! This is what I was just complaining about!” He’s a little red in the face.

“Karkat, shut up, I already feel guilty enough.”

“As you should, Strider. As your literal god—“

“Cut the fucking crap, Karkat. I’m trying to not subject you to the ‘blast chiller’ that is talking about my feelings and actually open up a little, ok? So can you just shut up and let me talk?”

“Yeah, sure, ok.”

“Thanks.” Instead of talking you settle more comfortably onto him, leaning in and hugging him tight. He hesitantly places his hands on your waist. And fuck, you just love that. You’ve never even really been aware you have a waist, but you feel warm and tingly every time he holds you by it.

“So, now that were comfortably and suggestively snuggled in a distinctly flushed way, I assume you are going to continue to give me whiplash by finally having a feelings jam?”

“Oh fuck, I’m sorry, I keep fucking this up, I just, we can move, I don’t want to—“ 

“Oh, calm your nonexistent rumble spheres, I’m the only troll in existence that enjoys quadrant whiplash. There’s something wrong with my pan that makes me want people in all the quadrants at once. I’m broken, I only want one person at a time instead of five, which is fucking weird and unnatural, and just another reason I deserve to be culled. But whatever, what else is new?”

“You’re not broken. I’m broken.”

His hands leave your waist, and grip your head, guiding you away from his neck, and bringing you eye to eye; shit, he must be able to see through your shades like this, fuck, fuck, fuck. You’re breathing fast and short.

“Shhhh Dave, shhhhh. You’re not broken. So you like girls and boys. That’s normal.”

“S’not normal,” you say, pulling your head away and hiding your face in his neck again. Coward. 

He starts making that cicada sound, one hand returning to your waist (yes, good), the other hand stroking your hair (also good). (God you’re gay, why are you this gay?)

“Ok, different approach for the idiot. We’re going to talk about this in a different way now. The idiot is you, by the way. Why is it not normal?”

“’Cuz boys are supposed to like girls.”

“Why?”

“Ugh, I don’t know, that’s just what’s supposed to happen. You’ve seen all the human romcoms, and all of them are about guys falling for chicks. Y’know, Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. It’s just, natural to be straight. The whole fucking animal kingdom only gets down and dirty when opposite genitalia is involved.”

He stops running his fingers through your hair.

“Opposite genitalia?” 

“Y’know, dicks and vaginas, man.”

“You don’t have both?”

You sit up straighter, pull your head up to face him. “You do?”

He’s red, you’re probably red. Yeah, you’re definitely red, you can feel the heat on your face. He breaks eye contact. “Why are we talking about alien genitalia Dave, this is stupid.”

“No way bro, this is possibly the most important conversation we’ve ever had. Show me your weird alien junk man. I need to document this.”

“I am not showing you jack shit Strider!” And then his voice dips, the cicada sound turns into the deep rumbling purr, and he reestablishes eye contact. “Not until we go on a couple of dates, at least.”

You are beet red, you have no doubt. Did Karkat just insinuate that he wants to have sex with you? Oh fuck, your brain, its stalling.”

“I-I um. I—I. Hnn.”

Karkat laughs. “Is that really all it takes to render the great and mighty Dave Strider speechless?” 

“U-uh.”

Karkat laughs again. “Finally, a way to shut you up.” He’s grinning that grin your love. And then he’s leaning forward, closing the distance between you, until you’re kissing. You’re eyes go wide, and part of you is screaming fuck yes, and part of you wants to throw up because this is wrong. But you’re kissing him back, and it feels good, so good that disgusted feeling is going away.

He pushes you out of his lap gently, and you make an upset sound as you shift. God, you’re so pathetic. 

But uh, that’s a good thing for trolls, right?

It must be, because his hands are on your shoulders, and he’s pushing you onto your back. You go willingly, and he looms over you, one elbow propping him up, the other settling against your cheek. Your distinctly aware that he has settled himself between your legs, forcing you to sprawl your legs open like an easy lay. You’re more than a little self-conscious, and uncomfortable being the bitch in this situation, but then he shifts and there’s pressure against your dick and you forget all about it.

You throw your arms around his neck and pull him closer, hands going up into his hair, one brushing against one of his horns. It’s velvety, and you can’t resist rubbing your fingers over it more. Karkat’s purring kicks up a notch, and he takes a shuttering breath against your lips.

When he speaks, his voice is deep and rumbling, and just, so fucking attractive. “Bit forward there, are we? Save it for the third date.” 

“S-sorry, I— “ 

“Shoosh, its fine,” he rumbles, and then he’s back to kissing you. You wrap your arms around his neck so you won’t be tempted to touch his horns again, and shyly open your lips and dart your tongue out, wanting to move this to full out sloppy make out territory, but not sure if he wants to go there or not.

He’s not taking the bait, just continues to kiss you, not chastely, no, not chastely, but not as dirty as you’d like. You pull him in a little closer and lick at the seam of his mouth. He gets the idea and opens up for you, and your tongues slide together. He shifts, something hard in his pants pressing more firmly into your dick, and you let out a tiny noise you refuse to admit might have been a moan. 

Yeah, you’re hard. But, in your defense, you’re a teenage boy, and you’ve only made out once before and it was with yourself, so, it doesn’t really count.

And Karkat seems to be too, so, fuck it.

Wait. 

Fuck.

You’re hard. Because of a boy. 

You panic.

And moments later, you’re lurching awake, breathing hard, red faced, in your room on the meteor. You can feel your dick throbbing, needy, Karkat’s leg pressed against it as he continues to sleep. Your breath is short and quick, and you feel disgusting. So disgusting. You untangle yourself from Karkat, not as careful as you should be to not wake him up, and run to the bathroom.

You have things you need to sort out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter might be the last one. its already written and I kinda like it as an ending, so we'll see.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave does some thinkin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout out to Hell Fucking Yes for reminding me that this has been written AND edited for 4 months and I just haven't posted it yet. Also guess what, my beta is now my fiancee. Yay, lesbians getting married.
> 
> Now hurry up and read about our best boys.

You’re in the shower again, letting the cold water run over you, one hand hovering on your hip bones, decidedly not touching your dick. You want to, oh god, do you want to. But that would probably be too much. 

Then again, you did just kind of have a sex dream. Well, not sex, but like, sexual. And not dream, because that was real. Or dream bubble real. You actually did that with Karkat; actually got hard from him pressing against your dick.

Deep breaths, Dave. You’ve got this. Keep your cool.

You turn the water warmer. The goosebumps on your arms, legs, whole body go away. Yeah, thanks body, all of you will fucking prickle up in freezing water, but you’re dick stays hot, heavy, and riled up. 

Fucking puberty.

You move your hand to grip your dick. It twitches. You turn the water hotter, to your normal, optimal shower temperature, and start moving your hand.

You don’t even try to not think about Karkat. 

You embrace the gay. The good feelings, some mental, most physical, overtake the gross ones. You think about Karkat. You remember his lips on yours, your tongue sliding into his mouth. The weight of him on top of you. His pelvis against yours. 

Deep breaths, Dave. Remember to breath.

You think about his dick pressed against yours, and your body crumbles as you cum-- harder than you ever have before. You lean hard against the cool shower walls, body complaining about the temperature difference of cold tile and hot water.

But you don’t care.

Your legs are jello, and you let yourself fall to your knees. Gross, look at that jizz, doing that thing it does with shower drains. You’re going to have to clean that up. You definitely don’t want to explain yourself to any of the girls. Or Karkat.

Oh fuck, Karkat. You just left him there. What if he wakes up?

You hurry up. Stand up, relish the hot water for a couple more seconds before turning it off. You have no towel other than the damp one Karkat gave you…how many hours ago? How long have you been out?

You feel real cheated that as a hero of time, you don’t always know the time. That hardly seems fair. Rose always seems to know…light shit. But maybe that’s just her class? Yeah, probably. If you were Seer of Time you’d probably be more clock than person, but that would fucking suck. Knights are the cool class. Karkat would definitely agree with—oh fuck, Karkat, you’re supposed to be hurrying.

You settle for the damp towel. It does the job even if it feels gross, and then put on your god tier pjs.

Urgency takes over once you step into the hall. You book it to your room, pushing the door open as quietly as you can, and floating over to the bed where Karkat still lays, utterly dead to the world and snoring gently. So fucking cute.

You don’t feel sick for saying that. Well, maybe a little. But you think that’s something you can beat out of yourself.

Ugh, bad choice of words. The word beat just makes you think of Bro.

Come on Strider, he’s dead and gone. You’re the only one here beating yourself up for being gay.

Maybe it’s time to just…get over it. You feel like maybe just thinking that is a step forward. You can do this, if you just take it one step at a time.

You settle yourself onto the mattress as gently as possible. Karkat doesn’t stir much, he just flings an arm over his head. You lay yourself down next to him, pull the blanket he’s pretty much commandeered over you too.

The sound of his breathing, even his adorable little snore, is soothing. You quickly find yourself with heavy eyelids. 

You go to take off your shades, and realize they’re not on your face. You never put them back on.

You dig your palms into your eye sockets. What’s gotten into you lately?

Love says a little voice in your head.

Yeah, you think. Maybe that’s it.

You look at Karkat in the darkness, turning to lay on your side. He wouldn’t mind if you threw an arm around him, right? 

Nah, he’d be cool with it. You just have to go gentle so you don’t wake him up.

You do it, as sneaky as you can. You feel an instant rush of warmth as you do. Physical contact is so fucking nice. Sleeping Karkat seems to think so too, he turns on his side and smooshes his face into your chest.

Your heart does the usually flip flop. The good-bad tango. The old razzle-frazzle. Skipping a beat twice in a row for different reason. The swim then sink.

You’re fixating. Choose one or the other.

You choose good. You let your heart fly, and ignore the gross, wrong feelings. It takes time, and a lot of concentrating on how nice this feels, to just hold someone. No. To just hold Karkat. But the gross feelings subside. 

You’re left feeling warmer than you’ve ever felt. And not just on this rock. You feel warmer than a summer day in Texas. But in a good way. You smile. You smile like you haven’t done in a long, long, time. Maybe like you’ve never done before.

This feels good. This feels right. Bro be damned, old Earth be damn. You’re holding your boyfriend and it feels good.

Wait. 

Oh fuck.

What did you just think?

You run that sentence through your head again. 

You…have to talk to Karkat. Again.

You run your fingers through said troll’s hair. You feel the rumbling purr start up in his chest, even though he still seems to be asleep.

That’s ok. You need some time to think. And he needs the sleep. The two of you can talk about this when he wakes up. For now, you’re happy to hold him, pet his hair, and maybe drift off again, comforted by his warmth. You’ve got this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Think I'm going to leave it here. I might add on, might not. I just graduated college so I'm burnt out and job hunting, so don't expect anything soon.
> 
> At the same time, feel free to drop a comment in like 4 month being like, complimentary and stuff and then I'll probably write more. I'm very comment driven (as you can see by me only posting the ending like a dumbass after someone reminded me.) 
> 
> Hope you guys had as good a time reading this as I did writing. This has probably become my favorite fic that I've written, hope its touched some of you guys too.
> 
> p.s. my tumblr is the same as my name here, and I take requests.


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